Thursday, 26 November 2009

A Steam-punk\Victorian Sci Fi mini campaign set out in the asteroid fields, which apparently are filled with independent Cornish miners and the fleets of the Great (and not so great) Powers which are trying to take over.

Asteroids are spread out at roughly two to three hex intervals, making a merchant\supply ship with your fleet essential if you need to hop quickly from one to another.

Builds are done at the end of each turn and use a mechanism similar to that used in a Ancient Greek naval campaign done long ago at the club. The better ships are harder to build (12+ for a Battleship) but get easier after each turn of failure. (plus one per turn)

Poor Spain nearly got knocked out early, becoming the victim of the first battle, and ended up with all their asteroids captured by others leaving only 'a ragtag fugitive fleet' of destroyers and merchants floating in neutral space. Maybe an idea for a TV series there. Unfortunately this gave the Italians a number of captured ships, including a battleship.

Everybody else is slowly heading towards the victory condition of 6 out of the available 19 asteroids. Matt moves his fleet into the same hex that I've just captured in an attempt to hold him off, having to give up one of my hexes to move there. It's an even fight, both of us having a Battleship, Fortified Cruiser and a Merchant, but some bad rolls for damage control doomed my ships after the first exchange of fire.

So the Italians end as the dominant force in the asteroid belt, which might make up for getting kicked around in Africa.¶

The Germans got a captured Russo-Balt Armoured Car to play with, scratch built by Dave M; again no official rules for this type so guesswork involved. Not as good as the ones the British get to play with. Reinforcements are available based on die rolls at the start of each turn.

The AC rushes, or more like tootles at 9" rough and 12" on-road, down the road towards the enemy in an attempt to slow their advance, and maybe give the German troops enough time to get into position.

The Russian Infantry ignore the Car, not even attempting to swarm it. Instead they set up their HMG and after a couple of bursts destroy its forward MG and then the Car itself.

Questions were asked over the mobility of the HMGs as according to the rules, once setup they should remain in place for the rest of the game. This would of left the Russian MG blind to the rest of the battlefield so implemented a couple of turns delay and then allow it to move again.

Assault on the main ruins. Both forces arrived in consecutive turns but it was the Germans who launched an assault, should Russians have got cover save as both forces were internal to the building. Germans soon become out numbered as extra Russian troops pour in.

Forces in woods not particularly well protected as both platoons resident there get chipped away.

Russian Mobile reinforcements turn up. Three Armoured Cars, Two Russo-Balts making their way past the wreck of the German vehicle, and a Putilov-Garford reversing to try and get it's rear-mounted gun into action.

Additional German troops finally turn up and advance towards the centre, managing to wipe out a platoon of Russians who were pursuing the survivors from the big melee.

Unfortunately this wasn't enough to take the victory away from the Russians, who dominated the centre.

Things might of played quicker if the forces were entering on the long edges rather than having to move across the table. It took a number of turns till any action happened as the forces tried and close on each other.Prior to the battle there was reports of a strange unidentified object floating overhead. Apparently its green skinned inhabitants had got confused over the date of the big space battle, turning up a week late or centuries early depending on your time-frame.

Once again it's 'Good guys' vs 'Bad Guys'. All ships and terrain from Geordie Paul (not LaForge). Best of three capture, two planets and the base in between being the objectives.

The 'good guys' reach the moonbase first and enlist their help against the oncoming hoard. Not that it did the base much good as waves of Cylon Raiders destroyed nearly all the Eagles and Hawks newly launched from the base.

Even worse, The Borg Cube decides to do a bit of grazing, assimilating part of the base and repairing itself in the process. This damage was caused by the wave gun from the blue ship sent to protect the base.

The Blue Battlestar and friends suddenly work out that the Klingon is almost impossible to hit due to it's speed boost from its elite crew. Even combining weapons only gives a slight chance of doing light damage.

Both available versions of the Enterprise head to engage the Cube after easily dealing with the two Shadow craft.

The Wave Gun gets lucky and recharges straight off (a nice 6 on the die) and lines up for another closer ranged shot at the giant Oxo cube.

At this point the game was called, with the general agreement that the bad guys were going to lose, as the combined power of the ships present should take out the already chipped Borg, leaving only the Klingons and Cylons contesting a single planet.¶

Wednesday, 4 November 2009

More fighting for the defense of Crete. Regular setup of defending British\Empire troops verses German Paras and some regulars. This time a bridge assault with the Germans coming from both directions to try and dislodge the Brits in the Gorge so that they could link up. 20mm figures and terrain supplied by Matt. Rules are 40K based but with limited weapon range and ammo.

And for a change there was armour involved as 2 Panzer mk.III's try and take on a Matilda, a Light Tank, and some AT weapons.

As can be seen the centre section of the battle field was terrain heavy.

As I was in charge of the paras, trying to link up with the main force, I decided to place all my troops on one side of my deployment zone away from the open terrain. They hugged the terrain like mad when advancing with only my snipers and MGs popping up to shoot, and my observers sending in some mortar fire. Only really had one effective mortar (the sole medium) and spent most of the time trying to move my remaining light mortars forward.

A long range duel broke out between an MG34 and a Bofors gun. The Bofors eventually won but with it's crew badly depleted and was then taken out by fire from a couple of Anti-Tank Rifles.

The tank battle was a bit of a stand off as they traded shells at close range but with little penetration. The allied anti-tank gun never got a chance to fire as the panzer's refused to come directly down the road. One Panzer got a bit shaken for a while but no vehicles were put out of operation on either side.

Eventually the paras and regulars were able to wave at each other across from the high ground to the rear of the farm house, in which my sniper and observers were hidding, with a good view of the bridge.

The game ended at this point as the allies agreed to withdraw due to their low ammo situation. The Matilda was almost out of ammo, two rounds left, and with the German Infantry closing into charge range holding the bridge looked pretty unlikely.¶